“I don’t know who did it,” Hermes admitted. “Matt started showing the symptoms of the poisoning a few months ago. I have my suspicions it was someone from winter’s throne.” There was a tone that Hermes used that caused Jack to divert his gaze from the child.
“You thought I murdered him?”
“Can you blame me?”
Jack said nothing for the longest time as his jaw clenched. He eventually turned his gaze back to the child. “I could never take away a child’s family.” Hermes did not comment on this. “I’m going to place a guess he was long past healing?”
Hermes nodded sadly. “He was mortal. There was no healing him. No ambrosia could help his condition when he was already overdosed by it.” Jack watched the sad little girl with a steely gaze. Hermes took a step closer, a heavy frown plaguing his young face. “Don’t hurt her.”
Jack’s eyes did not flicker away from the little girl before he answered. “She has a decade. If I can’t unseal our fates by then, she’s honestly better off dead.”
“You don’t know her,” Hermes said with a look of utter disbelief. “She’s a sweet kid, Frost. Get to know her—”
“Look at what the gods did to her!” Jack suddenly growled. He teleported to the other side of Hermes. “Wake up and unravel your tunic from your ass. The child’s life was ruined centuries before she was born. Her mother sold her before she was even conceived. You, Triton, and Ajax attempted to hide Matthew, and for what? They still found them. Someone still got to him in order to kill him. Come on, you know the reason why he was murdered. It was possibly not even malicious. ’Twas simplicity. Now they’ll send the child straight to Hera to prepare her for her royal obligations as a future bride without any more interference from her sly mortal father.”
“No,” said Hermes sharply. “I promised Matthew on his deathbed I would make sure Elle spends her childhood with his family. She will not yet face the obligations.”
“I can’t imagine Hera is taking such a promise well.”
“She knows I can make it so Elle is not found for many years. Quite easily I could make it so she lives a mortal life without ever knowing what was to become of her destiny. It’s my way or no way.”
Jack balked. “Then why not spare her! If you truly hold that much power, why not give the girl a chance at a happy existence without contaminating it?”
“Because this is a design of fate,” said Hermes sharply. He whipped a finger toward child-Elle’s direction. “As loyal as I am to Matthew’s wishes, I always knew Elle’s sole reason for existing was to become your bride.”
Jack spat a long string of profanities. “So I suppose an immortal will be in the girl’s life as a keeper until it’s time to fetch her for her royal marriage. Then what? You drop the reveal on her that she never had a chance at a normal life? Bullshit,” Jack finally breathed, staring into empty space.
Hermes was silent for the longest time. “You know better than anyone you can’t outrun fate,” he eventually muttered, glancing at the young Elle with strong sadness.
Jack sent the god a harsh glare. “Bring up my family and I’ll destroy that cute corn field you have on Olympus with a harsh frost.”
Hermes sighed. “Matthew was like a brother to me. Don’t kill his daughter.”
“I will not harm her.”
Hermes could see through Jack’s phrasing. “I know you won’t kill her as a kid. I’m speaking for when she reaches adulthood.”
Jack closed his eyes gently. “If I kill her, it’ll be an act of mercy. Dying is truly better than living a life where you have no free will.”
“What if you end up loving her?”
Jack’s head swiveled to stare at Hermes with an incredulous expression. “Love? I would never condemn myself to such wasted human emotion.”
Adult-Elle could feel someone was looking at her. Glancing around, she found the little boy from earlier standing nearby, watching her. “Why are you doing this?” she demanded. “You’re making me relive the worst day of my life in Jack Frost’s point of view. Why?”
“Are you missing the point?” the boy asked, arching a brow. “You’re here to learn a lesson.”
“That Jack isn’t actually a bad person?”
The boy was watching the sky airily before Elle spoke. As soon as the words left her mouth, his head snapped to look at her. His expression was full of contempt. “That’s the lesson you took from this?”
Elle watched Jack Frost and Hermes continue to argue before she sighed. “He’s a victim of circumstance—”
“Have you not heard anyone who encounters him? He’s a sociopath who cares for nothing and no one,” the boy countered with a glare. “Don’t think there’s more to it.”
“He’s the one who made that snow start so I wasn’t sad—”
“You’re missing the point—”
“Well, if your point was to make me feel sorry for Jack, you succeeded!” shouted Elle angrily.
The little boy disappeared. One moment he was watching Elle with a scowl before he was suddenly right beside her as he grabbed her arm and forced her down to his level. He was powerful. The young boy had gotten her to her knees as he glared harshly at her.
“No…” the boy said coldly, his too-grey eyes flashing dangerously. “The point of memory lane was to make you realize you don’t get a way out of this. You’ve been marked since before you were born, and you’ve been watched for a very long time. There is no escape, Letter,” he said coldly, looking rather frightening for an eight year old.
The nickname made Elle realize what she had been missing. Her eyes widened in sudden realization as she eyed the little boy before her. She knew she recognized his deep, mesmerizing eyes; it was because they belonged to the same god she spoke to before going to sleep. It was the same man who branded her the name Letter as a silent joke in reference to her name, Elle.
“Jack,” said Elle in surprise. The little boy soon grew a familiar crooked grin. She wasn’t wrong.
Elle gave a loud gasp as she woke up in a cold sweat. She trembled lightly as she stared around her dark room. She was back in her bed, and no one was with her. But she knew in her heart everything she had witnessed in the memory was real. Jack somehow showed her memories of the day he lost his family and of the day Elle lost her father. She wasn’t entirely sure what Jack Frost was trying to show her. It was undetermined to her whether he was trying to show her he had a shred of decency or whether he was trying to show her that she shouldn’t hold onto any faith that she could get out of this marriage.
As she gently began to cry, Elle realized immediately she wasn’t crying for herself. Her tears fell for the man who grew up cruel and hateful because his family and freedom of choice was ripped away from him at far too young.
***
From the far side of Elle’s room shaded in the absolute dark, Jack Frost leaned against the doorway. He watched her soundlessly while not revealing his presence. The immortal prince would be the first to admit he showed the girl memories from his timeline and hers in an act of spite. He knew firsthand that her optimism was rather pointless. Jack merely wanted her to see that for herself. Perhaps it would drop that look of pure determination from her face that she often sported.
The girl should realize that she never had and never would have a chance at normality. But Jack stiffened as the young woman laid her head against her pillow as she softly cried herself to sleep. An odd tingle of a feeling overcame him. It was an emotion that Jack thought long ago had become extinct in him. Guilt.
The day her father died was the second time he interacted with the girl before the night he tried to kill her.
As Jack Frost watched the dark-haired beauty sigh into her pillow, he silently reached the same conclusion that he had the day he saw her when she was just a child who lost a parent. He hated to see Elle Darrow cry.
Chapter Twenty
Jack wasn’t a bad person. That was the lesson Elle learned from the bizarre trip down memory lane the nig
ht before last. How it happened, she couldn’t explain. She knew that it did. If she were simply back home, she would deem this all illogical and impossible. That was no longer the case. Elle was in the land where make believe wasn’t as pretend as she once thought. People with magical abilities sat on thrones of gold and ice while calling themselves gods. They could appear and disappear as quickly as one could close their eyelids. That meant it wasn’t impossible Jack Frost could cause Elle to relive memories along with show her some of his own.
Elle completely neglected to grasp Jack’s attempt to point out that she had no hope of ever escaping the prophecy. In her mind, the lesson was that Jack Frost was not as cold-hearted as she previously thought.
He was utterly bizarre if he truly felt death was a better option for Elle than living, but she could see from his point of view why he would feel such a thing. He lost his entire life the same night his brothers tried to kill him. They murdered his family. He didn’t want young Elle condemned to the same fate that he had.
Elle hadn’t seen Jack the day after the odd dream. She was taken through a variety of courtesy lessons that a member of the royal family should learn before coronation. The entire day seemed to drag on entirely too long. Elle expected to see Jack at some point that day but was disappointed not to. He didn’t show up at any family meals or anything. At night, Elle tried staying awake as long as she could. She thought for a moment Jack would attempt to come and speak with her at some point during the night. He didn’t.
Breakfast with the royal family the following morning was awkward for Elle. King Boreas had important meetings to attend all day. That meant there was one less semi-friendly face to greet her at the table.
The difference between the day before and now was Jack Frost had reappeared. As usual, he was dressed in his strange navy attire that he seemed to wear every place he went. More than anything, Elle wanted to sneak a peek toward Jack’s direction at the far side of the table as he sat down. She wanted to know more about him. She wanted to know why he masqueraded as a little boy to take her down memory lane.
There had to be some motive behind it. Elle gently poked at the food on her plate, not feeling very invested in eating. She wanted answers, but she was afraid of how to touch the topic with Jack. He was too intimidating for her to simply poke her head up and ask. Would he deny it? Would he laugh about it? Would he make some snide remark before brushing her off? Elle didn’t know.
“You are not eating, Evangeline,” Khione exclaimed with a frown. “Did a kitchen keeper make a mistake?”
Elle mentally decided she would never be used to listening to these strangely beautiful accents. They sounded as though a lovely British and Australian accent produced a beautiful baby. Elle’s thoughts returned to Jack as she thought about his accent. Even though he had a lovely tone to him, he didn’t possess the same accent as other members of his family. His voice, although deep, had a strange alluring musical tone attached to it. It was feeling Jack’s eyes rake over her from his spot at the table that caused Elle to remember she still hadn’t replied to his sister.
“N-no,” Elle stuttered, gently shaking her head. Her plate of food consisted of fluffy scrambled eggs with salt and pepper. Pieces of fruit and buttered rolls sat on the side. The room smelled heavenly of ham, bacon, and the large bird-like creature that was in the middle of the table. Elle was hungry but held more of an appetite for information than food.
“There is no need to lie. Castle keepers exist to make sure members of the royal house are pampered at all times,” Khione said in a somewhat boastful manner.
“I’m not lying.”
“The rapid beating of your heart tells otherwise.” Calais grinned, tossing her a wink. Elle stiffened as the man watched her. She clearly remembered him from Jack’s memory. He had tried to kill someone who was completely defenseless against a brutal beating. Two gods versus a demigod who hadn’t developed his powers yet. Jack was truly lucky he didn’t die in that freezing lake.
Elle was certain her heart was beating even faster than before. She tried to pretend she was oblivious to her fear. Biting her inner cheek, Elle gently played with the food on her plate while Queen Oritya eyed her from down the table. “Zahara is blind,” the queen stated matter-of-factly, watching Elle with strongly pursed lips.
Zahara was the name of the wife who had been the main attacker in the arena. It was rather unfortunate it was the second Elle chose to take a small drink of orange juice that the queen revealed this information. She spluttered for a moment while praying nothing shot out of her nose. Elle painfully swallowed the drink. “Oh,” she squeaked out, feeling all eyes on her. “That’s unfortunate,” she offered stupidly.
Thump-thump-thump, thump-thump-THUMP. Elle couldn’t hear her own heartbeat, but she knew that’s what everyone seated at the table was listening to. She tried to show no fear, but she was certain it was radiating off of her with ease.
“Indeed,” said Queen Oritya as she nodded. “I would not wish to be the person who blinded her at the next training session,” she said calmly, allowing a castle keeper to use a fork to place a small bit of fruit into her mouth. She chewed and then swallowed in a very lady-like fashion. “The person who did such a thing very well might wind up without her eyes, nose, and tongue.”
Elle gulped.
She soon noticed how odd it was that the queen didn’t feed herself. That was when she noticed Khione ate the same way. Someone literally stood beside them, cut their food into smaller pieces, and then fed them as though they were small children. Elle usually kept her eyes locked on her own plate as she ate. All this time she had neglected to see that the women of the royal family didn’t feed themselves.
“Would you like some assistance, Princess?” a young woman questioned quietly from beside Elle.
“With what?” said Elle. It was as the young woman nodded her red head toward her food that it caused Elle to laugh. Her oddball laughter echoed throughout the very large dining hall. It was hearing her own laughter that caused Elle to stupidly chuckle some more. She’d spent so much time living in fear and trying to figure out an escape she neglected to see how funny it was that the women of the royal family were fed like toddlers. Elle half expected the castle keepers to start whistling while chanting in happy squeals, “Here comes the airplane.”
It was noticing all eyes on her that caused Elle to clear her throat awkwardly after her laughter. She looked back at her own castle keeper while gently shaking her head. It was difficult trying to maintain a straight face. “Er…no, thank you.”
The castle keeper nodded before disappearing. Queen Oritya watched her from her spot down the very long table. Her eyes held no caring as her lips were tightly pursed. “You are a rather odd individual, even for being half mortal,” she said, her comment directed solely at Elle.
“Thank you.”
The queen’s brows furrowed. “That was not a compliment, child.”
Elle nodded. “I choose to look at it as one.”
A quiet musical chuckle was heard. Elle didn’t need to look at the person providing it. She knew automatically Jack Frost was the only person capable of providing that strangely attractive laugh. He either found her comment funny or he was chuckling at his stepmother’s annoyance.
“Do you comprehend such an attitude is not allowed as Queen of Winter’s kingdom?” Oritya asked coldly, her castle keeper even looking afraid. It wasn’t apparent whether the queen was annoyed by Elle’s comment or Jack’s chuckle.
Elle decided to play dumb. “What attitude? You insulted me and I instead took it as a compliment.”
“I do not like your tone.”
“And I don’t like that you sent Zetes’ wives into the arena to maim me. I guess we’re even,” said Elle, her eyes unblinking as she returned the hard stare Oritya cast her.
The queen looked to be on the verge of fuming. “Do you understand who it is you are speaking to? Do you realize I could very well make the months before your coronation the
most miserable days of your pitiful life? It would make your time in the dungeons seem pleasant.”
Elle was about to angrily retort she would much rather spend her time in the dungeons and avoid Oritya altogether before Khione spoke.
“Mother, she is not yet aware of our customs,” she said nervously, obviously trying to diffuse the situation. “I am certain she means no disrespect.”
Elle wanted to snort. She meant all the disrespect in the world, and she didn’t care who knew it. However, she wasn’t quite sure if Oritya could follow through on her declaration so she didn’t want to push the queen too far. Elle kept her verbal barbs to herself. “What is on your agenda for today, Princess?” Calais suddenly asked. He as well as his sister seemed inclined to change the subject.
It took a few long seconds of awkward silence for Elle to realize the younger twin was speaking directly to her. She wasn’t used to someone speaking to her exclusively and not using a cruel tone with the exception of Khione. “I’ll be sitting in my room trying to think of new ways to break free of my abductors holding me against my will,” said Elle. “So, the usual.”
“Holding you against your will?” Calais asked with a playful smile. “I believe you are probably the first woman in the history of betrothal who has thought of an arranged marriage as such.”
Elle nearly rolled her eyes at that comment but thought better of it. That piece of attitude just might irritate the royals enough to send her back to confinement.
Elle suddenly missed Lucy. She would be able understand Elle’s hostile feelings toward this arranged marriage just fine. Having someone to talk to might ease the loneliness Elle was feeling. Jack was technically the only person around who knew exactly what she was going through, for he was going through the same thing.
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